


Jump

by bugsuit



Series: 100 Prompts - Archer [5]
Category: Archer (Cartoon)
Genre: Drinking, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-05
Updated: 2016-02-05
Packaged: 2018-05-18 08:44:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,071
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5916583
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bugsuit/pseuds/bugsuit
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A mission goes wrong, as per the norm. For a prompt challenge. (5. Action: character must have a drink. )</p>
            </blockquote>





	Jump

“Archer! You’re lagging behind!”

“I can see that, Lana, because for the _three hundredth time,_ I am _situationally aware!”_

Archer picked up his heels as a spray of bullets ricocheted past his feet, only vaguely aware of how similar to prancing this probably looked, and swung himself around the corner of the staircase. He ducked low and pressed himself flat against the stairs. The others were still too far off, and the wall was only just low enough to give him some cover.

“Lana!”

“Archer, where are you?”

“Situational awareness, Lana!” A bullet chipped into the wall, upsettingly close to his shoulder. He carefully moved his hand in towards his stomach where its cargo would be safer. _“On the stairs!_ How hard can it be to hit a bunch of drunk Irish drug dealers?”

The bullets stopped and all he could hear above the whine of his tinnitus was the sound of reloading. They’d figured out they couldn’t hit him. Which meant they were smart enough to save their bullets until they could. _Damn it._

But they had a plan for situations like these. Granted, normally it wasn’t him who got left behind, but still.

“God damn it,” he said under his breath, and then yelled, _“Marco!”_

Archer counted to six.

 _“Polo!”_ Lana screamed, and launched into her spray ‘n’ pray routine right as Archer leapt to his feet and scrambled up the rest of the stairs.

He collapsed onto knees and one hand (the other was still being held off the floor, _not_ risking it, thank you) lungs pumping like crazy and honestly – feeling a little sick, now.

Archer looked up just in time to see Cyril’s expression distort into one of disgust, and then the little snitch adjusted his glasses, turned away, and ratted him out.

“Augh – _he’s got a glass of vodka, Lana!_ That’s why he’s so slow!”

“What the shit, Archer!” She spared a second to duck down and reload, and turned on him with all the fury of a woman, or maybe a tiger, scorned. “God damn it! Put down the vodka and focus on the mission! You know, _the one you blew?”_

“It’s not vodka, you _idiots,_ it’s poitín! You think I’d risk my life for _vodka?_ You can buy vodka anywhere and, spoiler alert, _every brand sucks!”_

Cyril frowned at him. “You’d risk it for poutine?”

 _“Poitín, Cyril!”_ Archer set the glass on the floor and stuck his hand down his pants, whipping out – to Cyril’s momentary dismay – his trusty crotch pistol and proceeding to lean over the wall and fire off a couple of shots. The sounds of two bodies slumping gave the Irish cause to stop firing, if only for a moment. “And it’s not some knockoff shit you get legally! I found it in the cellar and I’m, like, eighty per cent certain it’s the real deal!” He swept up the glass again and took an experimental sip, then winced. “Make that ninety per cent,” he croaked.

“You didn’t bring another gun?” Lana growled low in her throat and started moving, keeping her head below the wall and making her way up the stairs in the momentary lull in gunfire. “Only you. Only you would steal illegal moonshine from an abandoned castle during a drug bust operation.”

“I know, right?” Archer snickered, following just behind Cyril and wishing he could just shoot him in the ass and scooch on past. Surely, nobody would convict him. “Also, not abandoned, since it’s apparently _riddled with drug dealers._ Also, Cyril: hurry up!”

“Lana,” Cyril passed along, “Archer says hurry up.”

“I’m going to shoot both of you,” Lana grated out, and then sidestepped as they reached a large, wooden door. She turned to face back the way they’d come and trained her guns on Archer.

He held up his gun hand and slightly raised the glass of poitín, looking alarmed. “Whoa. Lana. Cyril first at least, c’mon.”

“Cyril. Check the lock.”

Oh. She was aiming past him. Archer let his hand drop and tried to look nonchalant, taking another sip of his drink. Yep, that was strong stuff. Honestly, though, maybe ninety was pushing it? It burned like hell but, yeah, probably not quite ninety. He doubted these guys were all that experienced with distillation.

“It’s open,” Cyril reported, and carefully tugged on the rusted handle until it creaked open. “Come on, let’s–”

“To the roof,” Lana snapped, in no mood for Cyril’s wobbly efforts at taking charge, and swept past them. “Archer! Hurry your ass up!”

The set of stairs behind the door were a little claustrophobic. There was just barely space for single file, and his elbow kept banging against the wall. “Coming! Jesus, Lana, this stuff is worth its weight in gold. If I spill any that’s just… throwing the baby out with the bathwater.”

_“Oh, shit!”_

“Lana, I didn’t even _mean_ to do a baby metaphor that time, calm your maternal rage – oh, _shit!”_ Archer interrupted himself, as he realised just what she’d been cursing at.

They’d reached the top of the stairs, and these opened out onto the roof. Of the castle. To which there was no other way down, and certainly no extraction waiting for them.

Lana pressed two fingers to her ear. _“Ray!_ Where’s that helicopter, honey?”

“Great,” Cyril muttered, wandering over to the edge and taking a deep breath. “Fantastic. We’re stuck.”

“Cyril, a good agent is never _stuck,”_ Archer chastised him, following him to the crumbling wall, and cleared his throat. “Though, yes, for all intents and purposes, it does _look_ like we’re stuck.”

The castle was one of those lofty, rough-hewn eyesores that stood on a lonely cliff, and Archer couldn’t help but think that maybe he wouldn’t think so little of this entire section of the world if they’d stop building shitty architecture in even shittier places. Far below, lashing against the cliff face in a dark grey swell, was the sea.

“That’s, uhm,” Archer began, but Cyril beat him to it.

“High. That’s _really_ high.”

“Please, I’ve been skinny-dipping from higher. There was this great place in Australia. Maybe the best thing I’ve done there considering every living thing in the country wants you to die horribly.” He paused. “But the water was a lot warmer and clearer, so...”

“So shut up,” Lana snapped, finishing the conversation she’d been having in private and stepping up behind them both. “There’s no extraction.”

_“What?”_

“Lana, what the hell?”

“Take it up with Malory! _Apparently_ she thinks so little of the Irish that she – and I quote – _didn’t think we’d need one,”_ she emphasised. Her eyes flicked to Archer, who caught himself mid-chuckle and sipped his drink to shut himself up. “And maybe we wouldn’t, if you hadn’t snuck off to steal their alcohol while me and Cyril were doing valuable recon!”

“I didn’t know there’d still be a guy down there, _Lana,_ I’m not psychic! Also, that’s where they were keeping the drugs! This whole castle is one big storage unit for illegal imports!” He kicked a loose brick and immediately regretted it, wincing himself into an angry rage. _“Ow!_ Everything about this operation is a huge waste of time! I didn’t even know Ireland cared about drugs! Shouldn’t they all be off _wooing sheep?”_

“That’s _Wales,_ and no! There are huge problems with drugs in nearly every part of the world and guess what – dealing with it is still dangerous and worthy of real caution! You _and_ your mother are such – such _sacks of-”_

“Now what?” Cyril cried, casting a worried glance back the way they’d come. “There’s no way we can make it back down without getting shot at!”

Archer peered once more over the edge of the castle wall, and opened his mouth to voice his suggestion. Lana caught his arm.

_“Noooope.”_

“Lana, it’s the only way!” He wrested himself away, buying himself time to force down another mouthful of poitín, and Lana made a disgusted noise. “Listen, I’m just feeling this stuff enough to do it. So I suggest you both take a drink, and… if there’s time, maybe empty out a water bottle or something, ‘cause all they had in their sad little distillery was a pint glass and I can’t jump into the sea with a pint glass full of poitín.”

_“Archer–”_

There was a shout from behind them, and the sounds of boots on stone.

“Okay,” he said quickly, “I guess I’m not taking any of this stuff back with me, then. Both of you take a drink and get ready to jump.”

Cyril boggled at him. Lana, only a little braver at this point, peered over the edge and made a very reluctant noise.

“Liquid courage, Lana!” He held out the pint glass and waggled it slightly, a little of the clear liquid inside sloshing over the rim. “God, I expected this from Cyril, but-“

“Ugh,” Cyril groaned suddenly. He grabbed the glass out of Archer’s hand, held his breath, and drank.

“Holy shit!” For once, the holding-up-a-finger protest didn’t slow him down, and he snatched the glass away. “Holy shit, _Cyril!_ That’s, like, eighty per cent!”

“Eighty-“ Cyril croaked out, and then lapsed into a coughing fit. He took a deep breath. “Eighty proof isn’t even that bad.”

“Eighty _per cent,_ Cyril! That’s like a hundred and sixty proof!”

“Oh,” Cyril said meekly, looking vaguely ill. “That’s a lot,” he muttered.

“No shit,” Lana said, and took the glass from Archer. “God damn it. I hate you.” She tipped it back and swallowed a couple of mouthfuls. There was no way this was going to hit her until long after they’d jumped, but the placebo effect of the alcohol burn was better than nothing at all.

“Yeah, so, you should both be incredibly grateful that I’m wasting it on you. Especially considering it was the only good thing to come out of this mission. And saving some would be great, so, does anyone have a flask, or-?” Archer stopped mid-sentence as the shouting increased in volume, and a gun cocked. They all glanced back at the steps that led back down into the castle, where an angry-looking group of men with guns was now spilling out onto the roof. “Never mind. Just jump.”

Lana turned to face the drop and felt her heart turn over. “Oh my God,” she whined, “I don’t think I can do this.”

“Cyril, push her!”

“No! No, Cyril, don’t you dare!”

“Archer, I don’t think I can do it either!”

Archer let out an angry roar of disapproval, and the Irishman fired. He had to admit, as the glass of poitín exploded all over his hands, it was a good shot. For, you know, a drunk Irish guy. (He had no reason to believe any of them were drunk, but he also had no reason not to. It was what he was going with.)

As angry as he was at the wasted alcohol, Archer couldn’t quite bring himself to leave his colleagues to their fate. Even if they were pansies. Especially Cyril, but also Lana. It wasn’t their fault that they were pansies, after all, except for Cyril.

It was getting harder to convince himself that leaving Cyril behind wasn’t a good idea, so Archer turned, grabbed Lana’s toned arm and a fistful of Cyril’s crinkly waterproof jacket, and landed a foot on the stonework. He vaguely remembered screaming the words, “Pencil fall! _Pencil fall!”_ over the top of Lana’s screaming and Cyril’s choked-up yell of horror, and then it had all gone black.

As for whether it had been a result of hitting the icy sea of Ireland’s coastline at what felt like a million miles per hour, or just something he could chalk up to the poitín soaking into his liver at a similar pace, Archer couldn’t decide.

He’d figure it out later, after they all stopped calling it a ‘pansy blackout’ and the realisation sunk in that he’d heroically saved everybody. _Again._

It was still kind of hard to justify saving Cyril, though. Next time, he thought. Next time he’d just leave him to the Irish, and Cyril could admit how great and _non-pansy-like_ he was while he was absorbing his weight in bullets.

There were a lot of next times, though. Archer drowned the thought in whiskey, which in hindsight tasted a lot better than poitín. So, not as big of a loss as he’d thought.

**Author's Note:**

> I kind of struggled with this one for a while because like... nearly every character in Archer is holding a drink nearly 24/7 and it's not really a big deal, so this was an exercise in trying to make a non-issue into something plot relevant. I feel like the result was a little weak in substance so I'm kinda glad to be moving on :^)
> 
> Also, if anyone would prefer I compile all of these into a single story with each prompt as a chapter, as opposed to a collection, I can probably do that! I tend to get carried away with prompts and I don't know if it'd be reasonable to have such length-variable and unrelated chapters in a work that would eventually have to end up with every single tag on AO3. I kind of don't want to be that person whose fic shows up under every tag, but I also don't want to be that person who everyone semi-resents for spamming a quiet section, so... thoughts?
> 
> (Oh, and lastly, no offense to either Ireland or Wales. To my defense, I currently live in the latter and have family in the former. Call it a fond crack at familiar turf or something. Wink.)


End file.
